Painted
by SolitaireAikanaro
Summary: Swirling, swirling, swirling crimson...Pretty child...After all, you're beautiful when you're dead...Rencentric


Wow...bet you guys thought I was dead, eh? Haven't posted in a while...

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_Dizzy, swirling spirals of painted red…_

Slender, bright white fingers twirl in crimson paint. Splatters of red appear on the polished wood floor, having dripped off the raised hand. Splayed fingers trail circles on the clean walls, creating streaky swirls of scarlet.

The hand absently twists to and fro, unconsciously painting a yin-yang in the midst of all the clouded red. It traces around the peace sign…then the hand curls into an angry fist, draws back, and a blow hits the wall hard, creating hairline cracks in the plaster.

_Reddening knuckles, splintered bone…_

The pale, slight figure stands, scarlet spreading on his once snowy robes. They fall about him, washing his skin a thin red colour. Ignoring the paint that trickles down his cheek, he slides into his bed. He arranges himself in a snake-like, sinuous motion, dragging his arms along. Where he touched, where he drew his sleeves across, the crinkled bed sheets stain deeply.

The boy falls asleep, calm eyes closing. He is tranquil in his painted room, colours sprayed over the walls and floor and tables and ceiling.

_Silent in repose, sleeping bloodstained bed…_

He wakes. When he blinks his thick inky lashes scrape flakes of dried paint from his cheek, but he takes no notice.

He rises, and walks to the mirror on the other sides of the room. The trail of his robe is so long it stretches loosely across, and remains on the bed.

A blank, pale-as-paper face looks back at him, delicate features marred by a vicious, violent crack in the glass. He doesn't mind. The jagged fissure fits him, is a proper part of his face. He likens it to the façade of a dropped china doll, broken lines upon empty perfection.

Not-gold eyes are the only other colour in the reflection. Everything else is red and white; even his violet hair has stained vermilion from thing he cannot, perhaps will not, remember.

Attention is drawn to the not-gold eyes. It wasn't a spark or glimmer that attracts him to them, for those died long before (if they'd ever existed). It is their absolute blankness. So dull and empty. _Not-gold_. A time so long ago it must've been another life had he thought they were gold. Gold like the sun, like the moon, like _life_. When reality had come on him, he shattered. But then again, perhaps it wasn't he. Because look at him now. Isn't he whole? Isn't he all there?

Not-gold.

_Cracked face he had never known…_

Sometimes he draws a sharp, gleaming knife across his wrists. Then he can see the bright paint well up from inside himself. In a place that could easily become so empty-white, colour fascinates him. That is why the paint is strewn everywhere, until the small room smells of something coppery and salty and dried.

He doesn't cut himself for the pain. He cannot feel anything, a continual anaesthetic running through his veins. And he does not really care if he leaves this world or not, so it isn't as if he were _suicidal_. He cuts for the paint, for the colour. Sometimes he does it for fun; because he's bored, but it's mostly for the paint.

In the beginning he had bandaged himself afterward, but now there isn't any point. He often drifts about, paint spilling from his slender wrists and ankles and neck.

There are designs on his body, carved by his own uncut, razor nails. Designs that well up and overflow and smear with crimson. He's proud of the designs. They are well planned out and carefully done, so he hates it when they close and heal. But then again, he can always redraw them.

_Loving blossoms sliced in ivory skin…_

He doesn't do much now. He spends days on end, just lying there. Lying with a bleary stare, his limbs motionless.

The painted boy is like that now. He's on his back, his arms and legs spread so he's like a five-pointed star.

He watches the paint on the ceiling drip; not flinching when drops fall and splatter on his own face. He never washes the paint away, so it ought to be surprising his face is still porcelain white. But he accepts that as fact.

The paint is thick and bright, coagulating easily on surfaces. It's warm and comforting on his skin, so he covers himself with it. Because deep down, he is so very cold.

_Serene, broken shell of a doll…_

His room isn't silent. It almost is – but then he'll hear the faint pounding again.

Apathetic eyes stare at the shaking door and its shivering knob, but he reasons the door mustn't be very strong, for though he can hardly hear the blows, the door trembles like an autumn leaf.

Along with the pounding he hears voices. Harsh, primitive sounds bellowing out one word.

"REN!"

_Ren_. He knows the word is meant to be in a different language, but he unconsciously translates it into his native tongue. _Ren_. It means 'person'. This translation is why he ignores the calls and ignores the pounding.

Person. They call for a person, so they cannot be calling for him. He is no person. He is nothing. _Ren_ cannot be meant for him.

_Furious smashing, love worn thin…_

He doesn't move anymore. He lies; upon his miles and miles of painted cloths, upon a floor so red it's black. The room isn't empty-white anymore, and the calls have stopped.

No sound stirs now. Not a breath disturbs the silence. It is quiet, so quiet the silence almost deafens him.

His head is tilted to the sides, arms splayed out around him. He used to watch the paint spill from his powder-white wrists, but now the blood that has slid down his face – into his eyes and mouth – blinds him. His lashes are sticky and clumped, and an everlasting flow in his throat chokes him. The paint continues to pass his cracked lips, filling his mouth until there is no room left and the liquid comes back out. Now not only are his eyes not-gold, they're not white.

The sockets are dyed a deep, permanent crimson, the paint never to be washed away. Sightless and bloody, the eyes stare into the mirror, looking as if they're crying.

_A painted picture, fallen from the wall…_

He's forgotten how to move. His eyes are transfixed, totally completely red with blood. They haven't closed in two years. He's so still, so perfect. So unmoving in comparison to the blood that slides down the walls and down his face.

His skin is unnaturally white. Whiter than paper and snow, it's almost as if the colour has _bled_ out. Who knows? Maybe it has.

It was difficult to open the door. The paint had dried and caked around it so thick that it was as hard as petrified wood. When the door forced open, the dried paint had flown like chunks of concrete. One piece crushed the painted boy's fingers.

Pirika had screamed when she laid eyes on Ren. Yoh and Horohoro had to look away, and even Anna paled. None dared to touch the blood-drenched corpse.

Five years ago Ren had retreated into his chambers. He must've have used some spirit power, for no matter how much the others had screamed, kicked and pleaded, the door remained tightly shut.

His friends would've have continued trying and trying for the rest of their lives – but one day Yoh received a phone call saying that Ren was fine, and in China. As the door had never opened in the last three years, they assumed he had left by way of a window, and stopped their efforts. Eventually they had all moved away, and gone on with their own lives.

Until Jun had contacted Yoh. Where was Ren? Her voice had been calm and casual. She hadn't heard from him in what, five years? And he'd missed her wedding!

So where was the rascal?

She'd received no answer, for by then Yoh had dropped the phone and had run out, his friends at his heels.

They went back to the old house, and straight up to what used to be Ren's room.

They'd pounded on the door, and finally Amidamaru had to break it down.

Really, what had they expected? Five years gone. Would Ren have been still there, scowling at them?

All there was was his lifeless body, and the thick liquid that slid down the walls. The stench of the slowly decaying body had been overlaid with the sweet fragrance of the blood.

They tried to move him, but when Horohoro moved to raise the body, Ren's powder-white throat stretched, the bones and veins visible and straining. It would've broken if Horohoro had not put him back down.

His friends remained there for days, grieving over his broken corpse.

The words etched in the mirror mocked then, and the paint moved like a living creature, sinking into their clothes.

Not-gold eyes stared from the shadows and reflected in the cracked glass, unblinking as they stained red.

"_Pretty, pretty child…_" The words went unheard.

Dizzy, swirling spirals of painted red 

_Reddening knuckles, splintered bone_

_Silent in repose, sleeping bloodstained bed_

_Cracked face he had never known_

_Loving blossoms sliced in ivory skin_

_Serene, broken shell of a doll_

_Furious smashing, love worn thin_

_A painted picture, fallen from the wall_

_Pretty, pretty child_

_Is he pretty now?_

_Living paint, moving in death_

_Staining what was shining gold_

_Choking off his very last breath_

_Bone-white skin growing heavenly cold_

_But he doesn't mind_

_He's joyful instead_

_After all,_

_You're beautiful when you're dead_

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